Letters
by ChasingADyingSun
Summary: An old piece playing on the relationship between Prussia, the British Colonies, and Britain during the first Dutch-English War. More emotional weight than historical.


(For historical context this begins at the first Anglo-Dutch War.)

Alfred was a sheltered pawn.  
Though it is a word to be used lightly. For a boy of immeasurable ability in strength and production he was raw. To raw, like his backwoods militias of farmers, like the unworked ore of his smiths, like the skinned knees of simple village boys bathing in the burning yellow sun.

He was raised on ancient traditions and on tales so tall they caressed the very stars of the night; torn from the very same life and forced into a servitude under the critical eye of a European master.

He had died a bitter death, his Native memories and simple ways cast to the wolves. Reborn a model brother to his master and raised as such. Locked away from any other nation.

He never had to file a sheet of paperwork in his life, fill a form, handle any alliances. But he was educated, well fed, and happy. He could tell you why the caged bird sang and could recite any tune from the inside of his golden cage.

Of course he was still a boy, not more than 10 in body. His fingers still chubby and his cheeks rounded. With soft sides and tiny feet. His curiosity was still rooted deep within him. So the boy hatched a plan, sneaking sheets of parchment to draft until he had a solid plan.

Little Alfred wrote a letter, using his brother's seal to ensure it reached the desired nation, and sent it to Europe with one of the slave ships. Of course it took a few months for any sort of word back, and Alfred has been careful as to not alert Arthur to anything for the short amount of time he was still there.

In the fourteenth day of the sixth month of the year there was a letter. One trimmed in black and red with the grandest seal he has ever seen. And his own name on the front. Alfred hid away from him help, in he and his brother's study to read over the words.

Alfred tried his best to open the letter without disrupting the seal but it was brittle and cracked beneath his small fingers. But it broke in twin halves and the two sections fell to the floor, forgotten by blue eyes and blond hair.

It was from the Prussian representation himself and he could barely contain his glee over the words. His handwriting was flawless, sprawling comfortable over the page as a king does his throne. The actual message was far more exciting. Alfred had asked the man many things in his letter, he asked of his nation. The government, the buildings, the people, the language. He also asked of him, his name (besides Prussian pest or Germanic wench), his likes, his take on the war.

Alfred fell in love with every syllable and down stroke, enamored with the man across the ocean and his wild stories of his home. Alfred launched himself for the nearest quill and began a reply (for Gilbert had asked of his own home)!

Little fingers flicked across the page, lettering not as perfect but he tried his best. After five ruined letters and a full lamp burned clean of oil he had his letter.

That night he drifted off with ink stains painting his hand.

This arrangement would keep for seven years.

Arthur was a hardened soldier.  
It is a word to be used literally. For a man able to conquer half the globe in time for tea he could have such a loving hand. Though he was rarely loving, and his love was like the aloe after a burn, the lolly after a doctor, the sermon after the sin.

He was raised on isolation and self sufficiency so heavy on the 'self' that he could carry himself without human interaction for years; torn from the very same life to live as the property under the critical eye of a European master.

He had died a million deaths, wars and battles not forgotten under the black sky. Always reborn to be the model of a proper nation. Forced to mingle with other nations.

He spent much of his time filing paperwork, in a number of places. In his home back in England, on India shores, in Australian prairies, in Canadian cabins. But his favorite place was his little study, in the little home in Virginia. He knew every corner of that study, every scratch his brother put in the wood when he ran through the rooms with his play rifle. Every streak made in the dust (for little Alfred always forgot to do his share in housecleaning).

It took an hour of sitting in that brown chair for Arthur to notice something pressed into the indents of the desk. Shavings, in red, but the hue was not the one he used. And Arthur hasn't cracked a seal in years.

He was suspicious, he had suspected the help. Meredith had a husband across the pond that she mailed frequently. So he went about his usual, filling forms on trade routes, and the Dutch, and a thousand things that held no interest to him.

In his dazed state he was careless, his elbow knocking over a paper. Artur sighed and bent to lift it.

More shavings, the great empire took a knee, bending down to find more. One mass that had obviously been forgotten and trampled. Another in tact. Arthur held the half to the light, the symbol familiar. Arthur crushed the half in his fingers.

_Prussia._

Alfred, the boy with ink on his fingers was woken by an open palm. Stinging over his back and sending him across the mattress and off the bed.

"Alfred. Lad. Have you been in my study?" His study, no longer theirs, nothing was theirs because Alfred had nothing. Alfred only had what Britain permitted him.

"Yes." The boy knelled on the opposing side of the bed, hands gripping the sheets hanging off the edge as his bad burned and ached.

"Doing what?" Britain intoned, narrowing his eyes as he walked around the bed to meet Alfred, pulling the shaking boy up into his arms. "And do not lie to me lad." And his little colony squirmed, shook, flinched when a thick skinned hand felt over the mark on his back.

"Writing letters."  
"To. Who?"

Gilbert was a clever politician.  
A word to be used carefully. For a man of such a silver tongue he chooses to dance with a fluidity reserved for holy figures across war grounds rather than work politics. He was an unknown, the joker in a set of cards, the spy hidden in a rally, the Gatsby of the court.

But he was different than the others, different from what a lot of people may think. For when England would be given his letters to Alfred they would show no persuasion. For the key to the cipher had been disposed. Gilbert telling his dear bird to cast it to the fire. England would think him to dull for the deceit and Alfred would be devout to keep this a secret '_a secret of utmost importance between you and I_' were Gilbert's very words.

It worked more seamlessly than he had thought, the first letter after Arthur discovering what quite shaken. But the boy had kept his oath. And so the letters continued, and try as Britain might he could find no irregularity in any one.

But Gilbert was a clever man, with a clever mind, and a clever one. And in each letter the messages were more forceful, more dire. The change so slight that even he failed to notice it at times. Gilbert knew better than any, the right words could topple nations, and Gilbert was not about to stop at a mere nation. He would go for an empire so vast the world would shake as it fell.

Decades, his plan took decades but it was marked by success when years later he was invited to what would be a free country, across the sea. A request for help.

And so Gilbert sailed, dozens of days and nights, to take the little bird into his hands and show him just how weak his cage is.


End file.
